Course content chemical equilibria

To explain these conceptual problems, Bergquist Heikkinen (1990) have suggested that these are related to the content of chemistry courses. As discussed in the previous subsection, the concepts of reversible reactions and chemical equilibrium are at odds with conceptions of chemical reactions which are normally discussed earlier in the syllabus (see Table 1). 

Generalizing from the data, one notes the following not unexpected results about 10% of the course is devoted to the introductory concepts of stoichiometry and chemical equations more than 20% of the course is devoted to the study of structure of matter and chemical bonding acids and bases (Bronsted-Lowry) and equilibrium are the most extensively covered topics among the remaining content areas. 

At the upper secondary level, beyond the age of compulsory schooling, chemistry courses tend to differentiate into those for specialists ( science majors ) and for non-specialists. For non-specialists, a context-based course seems the only logical approach if they are studying chemistry, why not base it on contexts that are relevant to them An example of such a course is provided by ChemCom (American Chemical Society, 2001a). While this course claims to provide a foundation for further study of chemistry, it omits some of the content, such as orbitals, calculations dealing with equilibrium constants, and kinetics that would be found in a traditional chemistry course at this level in the US. 

This book is the result of teaching a one semester course in applied chemistry (Chemistry 224) to second year engineering students for over 15 years. The contents of the course evolved as the interests and needs of both the students and the engineering faculty changed. All the students had at least one semester of introductory chemistry and it has been assumed in this text that the students have been exposed to thermodynamics, chemical kinetics, solution equilibrium, and organic chemistry. These topics must be discussed either before starting the applied subjects or developed as required if the students are not familiar with these prerequisites. 

---